Nursing (Healthy policy values). Health, Medicine Research Paper

Healthy Policy Values
Name
Institution
Healthy Policy Values
Values play a very important role in society. The importance of values has spread across all spheres of life and now more than ever, organizations are adopting values to guide the decisions and actions of their employees and clients. Hospitals and health care organizations have also adopted values which guide the behaviors of their health professionals and patients. According to Barrett (2017), values improve engagement and ensure that an organization is solely focused on meeting the needs of all stakeholders, thus benefiting the general community. Healthcare professionals can, therefore, become patient-centered by integrating values in the delivery of care in all stages, including health care policy. It is therefore imperative to address the concept of values in relation to health care policy to analyze what role values play in the making of policy.
My personal values are intertwined with my spiritual beliefs. I was raised in a Christian home and as such, most of the values I have picked up from my parents and acquaintances are in line with the Christian teachings on values. I am an honest person who is kind and shows compassion to other people, especially when they are suffering. These values have been very fundamental in my career because they have helped me become more patient-centered in delivering care while at the same time believing that the health care system is changing for better because I am a hopeful person. As part of my upbringing, I was taught the importance of sharing and sacrificing part of my happiness to help someone in need. This is why I am able to put in long hours at work to help patients, sometimes by sacrificing my free time. I believe that these values have made me the person I am today and will continue to mold me to become an even better version both in my personal and professional life.
Personally, I think that the cost of healthcare has been poorly addressed by the health care policy. My opinion on this has been influenced by the increase in out of pocket payments despite an increase in the number of insured people. According to Rice, et al. (2018), the U.S. has a very high out of pocket (OOP) spending, closely followed by Switzerland among the high-income countries. This raises the questions on why the U.S. continues to experience high OOP spending yet more people have become insured through ACA. I think this is because the policy has not put enough effort into addressing costs but rather, has focused on accessibility. While more people have gained health insurance, the services insured are limited and as such, people end up spending more money to access services that are not fully covered through the policy. However, I believe that addressing the cost will require covering more medical services, which can be achieved through policy reforms. This is where my belief based on sharing and compassion comes in. The health care policy has failed to address the cost of health care despite being largely funded by public funds, mostly because of the lack of redistribution, which essentially implies sharing based on my personal values. In terms of quality, my opinion is that the healthcare policy has made considerable efforts to improve...